Now is a good time to propagate many of the perennials in your garden if they’ve become overgrown, if you just want to have more of a particular plant, or if they seem to have lost some of their hardiness.

If you look closely while hiking the forests around Steamboat Springs this fall, you might notice a pretty wide variety of mushrooms that are poking their heads through the leaf litter and conifer needles at the base of our alpine trees, perhaps because of all the wonderful moisture we've gotten this year.

The intense sun of our mountains seems to fade the color in our gardens as summer moves toward fall. With just a little planning, however, local gardeners can enjoy vibrant late summer/autumn color right up through first frost.

Plants that thrive in small places are invaluable in our mountain setting where most of our planting areas include rocks, steep inclines and stepping stone walkways. Many of these plants are hearty, often require very little care once established, crowd out unwanted weeds and lend beauty and softness to otherwise stark areas of our yards and gardens.

Now that many of our spring and early summer flowers are finished blooming, it's time to clean up around those beds by deadheading spent blooms (unless you want them to reseed your garden in places) and removing dead foliage.

Between grasshoppers and the hail storm we experienced a couple weeks ago, gardens in parts of Routt County are in a shambles. Plants and trees have been stripped of their leaves and many plants were so beaten down or chewed up it appears they might not recover from the damage.

The growing season this year started out cool and wet followed by a June with very little rain, and now a July with some wonderful rain storms. How do you manage your garden so plants survive through the dry and rainy spells?

Now that things seem to be getting back on track with the economy locally, more development is occurring in neighborhoods throughout the county. And more development often means less space and privacy in our yards and outdoor spaces. Trees and shrubs in your yard and garden can help you achieve a sense of privacy and personal space.

Recreating a wildflower palette in your yard isn't as simple as strewing a packet of wildflower seeds on top of your soil, as most gardeners who've tried this will tell you. But the rewards of a wildflower patch are worth the work involved to create this informal, natural landscape.